Practice Area Articles

There is a wave of litigation confronting Wisconsin health care providers: class action lawsuits alleging wrongful charges for medical record requests. Since May 2017, more than 40 class actions have been filed around the state. Patients have filed these cases after their personal injury attorneys requested and paid certain certification charges and retrieval fees for their health care records. The lawsuits allege that the health care providers and their vendors were not permitted to charge the statutorily-based fees to anyone whom the patient authorized in writing to obtain their health care records. The lawsuits demand the return of the allegedly wrongful charges, plus exemplary damages of between $1 and $25,000 per violation.